Recommendations on plants for this patch

Newbie gardener hi!
I have a white gravelled area in the garden that's really slim and long. Beneath the pebbles is weed liner then soil and I'm wanting to plant a few plants (perennials) in between the solar lights.
Ideally shallow roots as I don't want the fencing or next doors garden affected, something colourful to brighten this area up, and non invasive as I'm being brave and not planting in containers in the ground. This area gets some sun but not a lot. I have a cat so nothing toxic e.g lillies. Open to any suggestions although invasive things scare me as I don't get a lot of free time so low maintenance would be good. What do people think? Thank you for your help in advance

 

Hi. I'm no expert. I'm sure a climber to cover the fence would be a good start. The odd heuchera would add a bit of texture. That's about as far as my gardening knowledge goes. Give it a day or two. You will get plenty more from people who actually know what they're talking about.


G.

 

Hello leanne2511
A climber would be good if you have the depth of soil. It would transform the fencing there but you seem to doubt there is much soil there for it?
Nepeta would grow there....nice blue flowers all summer and would spread in a behaved way. If you had full sun there I would have gone for lavendar....nepeta is a good substitute though.
Campanulas too....Birch Hybrid is a lovely cascading variety. Campanula Dicksons Gold makes a mound of yellow evergreen foliage with blue flowers.
Agree with the heuchera suggestion.....evergreen foliage can be red, black, yellow, orange, green or silver grey. Has nice spikes of flowers in summer.
Some grasses to contrast with flowers would look good there like blue festuca, stipa tenniissima (very tactile evergreen with feathery flowers), carex Conan’s Bronze has foxy red evergreen mounding and cascading foliage and carex Buchannii has similar foliage colour but on upright foliage. A grass-like plant, ophiopogon nigrescens, has evergreen black foliage that would look good with your white gravel
Brunnera Hadspen Cream is a semi evergreen perennial with handsome variegated foliage and has flowers like forget me nots.
Pinks would do well there too.....nice evergreen blue mounds of foliage with scented flowers all summer long.
You could have a very attractive edge there Leanne esp if you contrast foliage colours and shapes for a year long display

 

Just wanted to thank you for your lovely informative post. Taken some of your recommendations on board and ive made a start on this area with a few perennials. Looks better already! I went for a Berry smoothie heuchera, Chicago sunrise hemerocarallis, campanula lactiflora, red jep erysimum and a potted phalaris grass. Also planted up my rattan bunny rabbit with a campanula get mee
When I dug down the soil was very clay like so unsure how well some of these will do but time will tell!

 

Oh also bought a nepeta and the cat loves it haha!

 

Thanks Leanne...always lovely to get such nice feedback
I like the look too

 

This is one of my posts from a couple of weeks ago